The spectacular aftermath of a supernova was just seen at its earliest stage ever

[brooklynite]

Washington Post

Life in this universe begins and ends with supernovae. In a spectacular eruption powerful enough to outshine a galaxy, a star is killed — and new elements are forged. The shock wave from the star’s death throes can cause nearby clouds of gas to collapse, triggering the birth of new suns. The ashes of the exploded star spread out into the dark void of space, filling it with ingredients for future stars and planets. Supernovae are creative catastrophes.

For years, scientists have been trying to capture the moment one happens. And they’re getting really close.

In a new study in the journal Nature Physics, an international team of astronomers describes the first three to 10 hours after a supernova in the galaxy NGC 7610, a faint smudge in the constellation Pegasus. Their observations, which came from an array of telescopes scattered across the planet and encompass a wide range of the light spectrum, represent the most complete image of a supernova’s immediate aftermath. Scientists were able to take spectra — analyses that separate light out into its component wavelengths — earlier in the event than had ever been done.

This is a “remarkable achievement,” Norbert Langer, an astronomer at the University of Bonn in Germany who was not involved in the study, wrote in an analysis for Nature Physics. “Young supernovae are hard to come by: without the knowledge of when and where they are going to explode, we tend to chance upon them when they are already several days old. By this time, the supernova ejecta have already swept through a large volume, destroying any information about its immediate environment.”